Introduction

Welcome! Navigation & Customer Forms

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Welcome to Access Beginner Level 7. In this course we will focus on making your database easier to navigate by using navigation forms, building a custom main menu form, and creating a customer list form. We will discuss the benefits and limitations of Access's built-in navigation forms, then walk through designing your own menu with labels and buttons, and finish by creating an alphabetical customer list that lets you open individual customer records. This course builds on Beginner Levels 1 through 6, and will help you improve the usability and organization of your Access database.

Navigation

Prev: B7
Next: Lesson 01

Keywords

Access Beginner, navigation forms, main menu form, custom menu, customer list form, command buttons, labels, open forms, alphabetical customer list, form formatting, open customer record, row and column format, student forums, AccessLearningZone

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Intro

Transcript

Welcome to Microsoft Access 2010 Beginner Level 7, brought to you by AccessLearningZone.com. I am your instructor, Richard Rost.

Today we are going to work on getting around in our database, making our database more friendly to navigate. We are going to start by seeing how to use the built-in navigation forms, a tool that Access provides, to allow us to quickly and easily navigate between a couple of different forms or reports. Navigation forms, however, have their limitations.

Next, I will teach you how to build your own main menu form using labels and command buttons to open other forms. This is the best way to take full control over the navigation of your database.

Finally, we will build a customer list form, which is a sorted, alphabetical list of customers. You can browse through them, click on any one of them, and then click on a button to go specifically to that customer's form. Again, this is a very powerful way to navigate through the records in your database.

We will not be using a lot of automatic wizards in this lesson. You will be learning how to do most of this from scratch. I feel it gives you a better appreciation for Access to learn how to do this stuff manually.

This class follows Access 2010 Beginner Level 6. If you have not taken my other classes, 1 through 6, you should visit my website at AccessLearningZone.com and take those classes before starting this one.

Today's class will be using Microsoft Access 2010. The lessons on the main menu and the customer list form will work in any version of Access. In fact, I used to teach those way back in my Access 2003 class. However, lesson 1, the navigation forms, is unique to Access 2010.

The good news is, if you are using an older version of Access, you really do not need the navigation forms. They are a quick tool that was added in Access 2010, but I think a custom main menu form is better, and that is why I spent a lot more time covering that.

You are strongly encouraged to build the database that I build in class and follow along with me. However, if you are lazy like I am, you can download a copy of the database that I build in this class by visiting my website, AccessLearningZone.com/databases, and there you will find a link to download today's database. But you will get more out of this lesson if you build the database yourself.

My courses are broken up into four groups: Beginner, Expert, Advanced, and Developer.

My beginner courses are for novice users who have little or no experience with Microsoft Access. They are designed to give you an overview of the basic features of Access and cover just what you need to know to be productive.

The expert classes are designed for more experienced users who are already comfortable with Access. Expert classes go into a lot more depth about each topic than the beginner classes do, and will cover more functions, features, tips, and techniques for power users.

Once you have mastered the expert classes, move up to the advanced lessons. You will learn how to work with macros, automation, and many more advanced features that really add enhanced functionality and professionalism to your databases.

Finally, my Developer Level courses are designed to teach you how to program in Visual Basic for Microsoft Access. This will allow you to create the most advanced database as possible and unlock the true potential of Microsoft Access.

Each series is broken down into different numbered levels, starting with level 1. Each subsequent level teaches you new and different topics in Microsoft Access, building on the lessons learned in the previous classes. Once you have finished all the beginner classes, move up to the expert series, then the advanced, and finally the developer lessons.

In addition to my normal Access classes, I also have seminars designed to teach specific topics. Some of my seminars include building web-based databases, creating forms and reports that look like calendars, securing your database, working with images and attachments, writing work orders, tracking accounts payable, learning the SQL programming language, and lots more. You can find complete details on all these seminars and more on my website at AccessLearningZone.com.

If you have questions about the topics covered in today's lessons, please feel free to post them in my student forums. If you are watching this course using my custom video player software or the online theater on my website, you should see the student forum for each lesson appear in a small window next to the class videos, as long as you have an active internet connection. Here you will see all of the questions that other students have asked, as well as my responses to them and comments that other students may have made. I encourage you to read through these questions and answers as you start each lesson and feel free to post your own questions and comments as well.

If you are not watching the lessons online, you can still visit the student forums later by visiting AccessLearningZone.com/forums.

To get the most out of this course, I recommend that you sit back, relax, and watch each lesson completely through once without trying to do anything on your computer. Then, replay the lesson from the beginning and follow along with my examples. Actually, create the same database that I make in the video, step by step. Do not try to apply what you are learning right now to other projects until you master the sample database from this class.

If you get stuck or do not understand something, watch the video again from the beginning or tell me what is wrong in the student forum.

Most importantly, keep an open mind. Access might seem intimidating at first, but once you get the hang of it, you will see that it is really easy to use.

Now, let us take a closer look at exactly what is covered in today's class.

In lesson 1, we are going to learn how to build navigation forms to quickly move between the different objects in your database.

In lesson 2, we are going to begin building our own custom main menu form.

In lesson 3, we will take the simple main menu form that we built in lesson 2 and format it, add more buttons, and make it look really cool.

In lesson 4, we are going to begin building a customer list form, which will be an alphabetical list of customers in a single form, so we can click on one of them and open up the full customer record.

In lesson 5, we are going to finish up our customer list form. We are going to set it up in a row and column format, and we are going to add buttons so we can click on a customer and have it open up the customer form directly on that customer.

Quiz

Q1. What is the main purpose of using navigation forms in Microsoft Access 2010?
A. To quickly and easily move between different forms or reports
B. To edit database tables directly
C. To print reports automatically
D. To backup data

Q2. Which lesson teaches you how to create your own custom main menu form?
A. Lesson 1
B. Lesson 2
C. Lesson 4
D. Lesson 5

Q3. Why does Richard prefer building a main menu form instead of relying on built-in navigation forms?
A. It allows more control over database navigation
B. It is faster to set up
C. It is only available in Access 2010
D. It automatically creates tables

Q4. What special feature does the customer list form have?
A. It allows you to browse and select a customer to open their full form
B. It can sort only by customer ID
C. It automatically deletes customers
D. It is available only in Access 2010

Q5. According to the instructor, what is the best way to get the most out of the class?
A. Watch the lesson once, then follow along building the same database
B. Read only the transcript
C. Take notes and move to the next lesson
D. Try to apply the concepts to your own projects immediately

Q6. Which version of Access introduced navigation forms?
A. Access 2010
B. Access 2003
C. Access 2007
D. Access XP

Q7. What are the four groups of courses that Richard provides?
A. Beginner, Expert, Advanced, Developer
B. Intro, Intermediate, Master, Expert
C. Beginner, Pro, SQL, Visual Basic
D. Basic, Advanced, SQL, Forms

Q8. What is the main advantage of learning to build menus and forms from scratch?
A. You gain a better appreciation for Access and understand it better
B. It saves time compared to using wizards
C. It automatically updates all records
D. It imports data from Excel

Q9. If you have questions about the course, what should you do?
A. Post them in the student forums
B. Email Microsoft support
C. Ignore them and continue
D. Wait for the next video

Q10. What is the recommended sequence for progressing through Richard's Access courses?
A. Beginner, Expert, Advanced, Developer
B. Developer, Advanced, Expert, Beginner
C. Advanced, Beginner, Expert, Developer
D. Expert, Beginner, Advanced, Developer

Q11. What is suggested if you get stuck during the lesson?
A. Watch the video again or ask for help in the forum
B. Switch to a different project
C. Skip the lesson
D. Restart your computer

Q12. Which Access version is required for the lesson on navigation forms?
A. Access 2010
B. Access 2003
C. Access 2016
D. All versions

Q13. What do the seminars offered by AccessLearningZone.com focus on?
A. Teaching specific topics related to Access
B. Marketing Access templates
C. Selling software licenses
D. Teaching Excel only

Q14. What is the recommended approach before applying what you learn to your own projects?
A. Master the sample database from the class first
B. Apply to your projects as you watch
C. Never use the sample database
D. Only read the textbook

Answers: 1-A; 2-B; 3-A; 4-A; 5-A; 6-A; 7-A; 8-A; 9-A; 10-A; 11-A; 12-A; 13-A; 14-A

DISCLAIMER: Quiz questions are AI generated. If you find any that are wrong, don't make sense, or aren't related to the video topic at hand, then please post a comment and let me know. Thanks.

Summary

Today's video from Access Learning Zone focuses on making it easier to move around inside your Microsoft Access 2010 database. My goal in this lesson is to show you how to create a more user-friendly navigation system in your projects. We start by looking at navigation forms, which are built into Access and give you a quick way to jump between forms and reports. While these forms can speed up building a basic menu, they come with limitations, so I do not rely on them too much.

Right after that, I'll guide you through building your own main menu form using labels and command buttons. Creating a custom menu gives you much more flexibility and control over how users interact with your database. This is my preferred approach and the method I recommend to anyone who wants a polished, reliable menu system.

Later in the video, we'll build a customer list form. This will be an alphabetical list that allows you to scroll through all your customers and pick any one of them. Once you pick a customer and click a button, you will go directly to that customer's individual form. This feature is extremely useful for databases where efficient navigation among lots of records is important.

Throughout this session, we will avoid relying too heavily on automatic wizards. I think learning to create these forms and buttons from scratch is important. Doing the work manually helps you understand what Access is doing for you behind the scenes.

This lesson picks up where Access 2010 Beginner Level 6 left off. If you have not already completed Levels 1 through 6, I recommend visiting my website at AccessLearningZone.com and going through those lessons first so you have the background needed for today's video.

Although I am using Access 2010 here, the instruction on building the main menu and customer list form applies to pretty much any version of Access, going all the way back to at least Access 2003. Only the navigation forms, discussed in the first part, are exclusive to Access 2010. If you are on an earlier version, do not worry. Navigation forms are not essential. In my professional opinion, a custom main menu is a much better approach to making your database user-friendly, which is why I focus so much on that in this lesson.

You are encouraged to actually build the database along with me as you watch the video. However, if you prefer, you can download the finished database from my website at AccessLearningZone.com/databases. Still, creating each step yourself will help you understand how everything works.

Let me remind you how my courses are structured. I offer lessons at four levels: Beginner, Expert, Advanced, and Developer. The beginner courses are for those who are new to Microsoft Access. They give you a broad overview of the core features and help you become productive quickly.

Expert courses are aimed at those who already feel comfortable in Access and are ready to learn more detailed information, new features, and advanced capabilities for power users.

After completing the expert series, you can move on to the advanced classes. Here, you'll start working with macros, automation tools, and additional techniques that make your databases more sophisticated.

Finally, my Developer lessons will teach you how to write code in Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) so you can unlock the most advanced and powerful features Microsoft Access has to offer.

Each course series is divided into numbered levels. Each level builds upon what you learned in the previous one, introducing new concepts and techniques. Once you complete the entire beginner series, you can move up to the expert series, then to the advanced, and finally to the developer level.

Besides my main Access classes, I provide seminars focused on specific topics. These cover areas such as web-based databases, making calendar-style forms and reports, securing your databases, using images and attachments, handling work orders, tracking accounts payable, learning SQL, and much more. You can find complete details for all these additional seminars on my website, AccessLearningZone.com.

If you have any questions about the material covered in this lesson, I encourage you to use the student forums. If you are watching the course through my custom video player or my online theater, the student forum for each lesson should appear in a small window next to the video, as long as you are connected to the internet. Here, you will find questions and answers from other students, my replies, and additional comments. It's a great resource to review before starting each lesson, and I hope you'll post your own questions if anything is unclear.

If you are not watching online, you can always visit the student forums later by heading to AccessLearningZone.com/forums.

To get the most out of this course, I recommend watching each lesson all the way through without trying to follow along initially. Then, after you have seen how everything fits together, replay the lesson from the start and build the sample database step by step just as I do in the video. Try not to use what you are learning immediately in other projects until you completely understand the sample database in this class.

If you have trouble or get stuck anywhere, go back and watch the video again or let me know about your issue in the student forum.

Most of all, approach Access with an open mind. It can look intimidating at first, but once you understand the basics, you will see that Access is quite simple to use.

Here's what you can expect in today's class:

In lesson 1, we will look at building navigation forms so you can move quickly between different objects in your database.

In lesson 2, we will get started on a custom main menu form.

In lesson 3, we will expand on the basic menu by adding more buttons and formatting it to look more professional.

In lesson 4, you will learn how to build a customer list form, which will display an alphabetical list of customers within a single form so you can choose one and view the full customer record.

In lesson 5, we will finish the customer list form, organize it in a row-and-column format, and add buttons that allow you to open a specific customer form directly.

You can find a complete video tutorial with step-by-step instructions on everything discussed here on my website at the link below. Live long and prosper, my friends.

Topic List

Using Access 2010 navigation forms
Building a custom main menu form
Adding labels and command buttons to forms
Opening forms from a main menu
Creating a customer list form
Sorting customers alphabetically in a form
Navigating to customer details from list form
Formatting the main menu form
Arranging customer list in row and column format
Adding buttons to open specific customer records
Manual creation of forms without wizards

Article

Welcome to this beginner's guide to making your Microsoft Access databases easier and more efficient to navigate. Today you will learn how to improve getting around in your database, starting with the use of navigation forms and moving on to building your own main menu and customer list forms. The skills you learn here will help not only with Access 2010 but with almost any version of Microsoft Access.

First, let us talk about navigation forms. In Access 2010, Microsoft introduced built-in navigation forms. These forms allow you to quickly create a simple menu that lets users switch between different forms or reports in your database. For example, you can create a navigation form where tabs run across the top or down the side. Each tab can open a different form, such as a customer entry form, an order entry form, or a reports page. To create your own navigation form, go to the "Create" tab, click on "Navigation," and select a style, like "Horizontal Tabs." Access will make a basic navigation form. You can then drag and drop other forms and reports into the tabs to quickly connect them. However, navigation forms are somewhat limited. You cannot customize their look much, and your control over the layout is restricted by what Microsoft designed the navigation form to do. That is why many experienced Access developers prefer to create custom main menu forms from scratch instead.

Next, we move on to building a main menu form with your own labels and command buttons. This approach gives you much more control over the appearance and functionality of your database. Start by creating a new blank form in Design View. Remove any default layout guides or labels to start fresh. To make the form a true menu, add a label at the top, such as "Main Menu," then insert command buttons for quick access to important features. For example, you might add a button labeled "Open Customer Form." To make the button work, right-click it, select "Build Event," and then use the following VBA code in the event handler:

DoCmd.OpenForm "CustomerF"

This code tells Access to open the form named "CustomerF" when the button is clicked. You can add more buttons for other forms, like opening an order form or a report. By creating your own main menu, you can arrange items exactly the way you want and add additional messages, graphics, or company logos. You can also further style your menu with colors and formatting. The main menu approach lets you guide users through your application smoothly and prevent them from getting lost in database objects they should not use directly.

After setting up your main menu, the next step is to build a customer list form. A customer list form is a practical way to view all your customers in a tidy, searchable list. Start by creating a new form using the customer table or query as its data source. Set the form's default view to "Continuous Forms" or "Datasheet," which shows rows for each customer. Arrange the fields you want to see, such as CustomerID, LastName, and FirstName. You can sort the list alphabetically by setting the "Order By" property of the form to LastName and then FirstName.

To make your customer list more interactive, add a button next to each customer that, when clicked, opens that customer's full detail form. To do this, include a command button in the details section of your continuous form. Set the OnClick event of the button to the following VBA code:

DoCmd.OpenForm "CustomerF", , , "CustomerID = " & Me.CustomerID

This code opens the CustomerF form filtered to just the selected customer, making it easy to jump straight from the list to the customer's detailed information. You can also place the entire list in a tabular format using the Layout tools, so it visually resembles a spreadsheet with columns and rows, making it easier to browse.

Throughout this process, building your forms manually, rather than relying only on wizards, gives you deeper understanding and more control over your database's functionality. You have the ability to change colors, arrange controls as desired, and fine-tune navigation to match your real needs. Even if you use an older version of Access that does not support navigation forms, the techniques for building a main menu and customer list form still apply. In fact, designing your own menu form is usually the best method for user-friendly navigation no matter what version you use.

As you learn these techniques, remember to build your sample database along the way. Practice makes perfect in Access. Try recreating the main menu and customer list forms yourself, even if you have access to sample databases online, because building by hand will teach you much more than importing finished work. If you get stuck, try reviewing your steps, look for spelling errors in form names, or check that your buttons run the correct code.

Once you master these beginner skills, you can move on to more advanced topics. After you become comfortable with moving around your database using custom menu forms like those you made here, you can progress to expert-level tasks, such as using more complex VBA code, creating macros for automation, and designing forms and reports that are even more interactive and professional.

Finally, if you want to grow further, developer-level skills will let you learn how to program in Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) so you can create advanced features and unleash the full power of Microsoft Access. For example, you can automate tasks, handle data with code, make custom dialog boxes, or interact with other programs.

For now, focus on building a user-friendly menu, understanding how to use command buttons and VBA for navigation, and setting up an interactive customer list form. These steps will make your Access databases much easier for you and your users to work with, laying a solid foundation for more advanced projects in the future. With practice and a step-by-step approach, working with Microsoft Access will go from intimidating to straightforward and even enjoyable.